When firmness is sufficient, rashness is unnecessary.Bonaparte,
Napoleon

What the wise do in the beginning, fools do in the end.Buffett,
Warren Edward

Think about how stupid the average person is, then realize half of them
are stupider than thatCarlin, George

Young men think old men are fools; but old men know young men are
fools.Chapman, George

When the eagles are silent, the parrots begin to jabber.Churchill,
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer

What the wise seek is in themselves, what the fool seeks is in
others.Confucius

The fool wonders, the wise man asksDisraeli, Benjamin

He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot
lose.Elliot, Jim
Hymn: He Is No Fool

If fifty million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish
thing.France, Anatole

It is human nature to think wisely and act foolishlyFrance,
Anatole

Experience keeps a dear school, but fools will learn in no
otherFranklin, Benjamin

It is the false shame of fools to try to conceal wounds that have not
healed.Horace

'Tis better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than open one's
mouth and remove all doubt.Johnson, Dr Samuel

Almost every man wastes part of his life attempting to display
qualities which he does not possess.Johnson, Dr Samuel

Who's more foolish, the fool or the fool who follows him?Kenobi,
Obi-Wan (Ben) Star
Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope

The surprising thing about young fools is how many survive to become
old foolsLarson, Doug

You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people
all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.Lincoln,
President Abraham

A foolish person is 'quick' to condemn what they do not understand. A
wise person is 'slow' to condemn what they do understandMartino,
Joseph P

Never allow yourself to be caught marching with a sign proclaiming the
world is going to end on Thursday; and it's Friday.Pearce, Matt

Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools talk because
they have to say something.Plato

Two dogs fight for a bone and a third runs away with it.Proverb

He who asks is a fool for five minutes, but he who does not ask remains
a fool forever.Proverb, Chinese

Absentmindedness is searching for the horse you are ridingProverb,
Russian

Fools look to tomorrow; wise men use tonight.Proverb, Scottish

If stupidity got us into this mess, then why can't it get us
out?Rogers, William Penn Adair

The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always
so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.Russell,
Bertrand Arthur William

A fool is someone whose pencil wears out before its eraser
doesSavant, Marilyn vos

The trouble with her is that she lacks the power of conversation but
not the power of speech.Shaw, George Bernard

I am patient with stupidity, but not with those who are proud of
itSitwell, Dame Edith

Sometimes the majority only means that all the fools are on the same
sideSmith, Michael W

The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly, is to
fill the world with foolsSpencer, Herbert

No man really becomes a fool until he stops asking
questionsSteinmetz, Charles

Because you don't know something doesn't make you an idiot, not doing
something about it does.Unknown

Fools' names, like fools' faces, are often seen in public
places.Unknown

Never give advice...A wise man won't need itA fool won't heed
it.

Unknown

Why do people with closed minds always open their
mouths?Unknown

Giving a fool advice is like hitting the air with a
stick.Unknown

(Qui molitur insidias in patriam id facit quod insanus nauta perforans
navem in qua vehitur) He who betrays his country is like the insane sailor
who bores a hole in the ship which carries him.Unknown

A tongue weighs so little, yet few can hold itUnknown

You don't drown by falling in the water, you drown by staying
thereUnknown

The probability of someone watching you is proportional to the
stupidity of your actionUnknown

Immaturity is the bane of progressUnknown

You don't learn anything the second time you're kicked by a
mule.Unknown

It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revereVoltaire
(Francois Marie Arouet)

He is a fool who cannot be angry; but he is a wise man who will
notSeneca, Lucius Annaeus

Attitude

The young man who has not wept is a savage, and the old man who will
not laugh is a fool.Santayana, George

Belief

There is only one greater folly than that of the fool who says in his
heart there is no God, and that is the folly of the people that says with
its head that it does not know whether there is a God or notBismarck,
Otto von

The first clergyman was the first rascal who met the first
foolVoltaire (Francois Marie Arouet)

Courage

To laugh is to risk appearing a fool,

To weep is to risk appearing sentimental.

To reach out to another is to risk involvement,

To expose feelings is to risk exposing your true self.

To place your ideas and dreams before a crowd is to risk their
loss.

To love is to risk not being loved in return,

To live is to risk dying,

To hope is to risk despair,

To try is to risk failure.

But risks must be taken because the greatest hazard in life is to risk
nothing. The person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing, is
nothing. He may avoid suffering and sorrow, but he cannot learn, feel
change, grow or live.

Chained by his servitude he is a slave who has forfeited all freedom.
Only a person who risks is free. The pessimist complains about the wind;
the optimist expects it to change; and the realist adjusts the
sails.Ward, William Arthur

Criticism

Any fool can criticize, condemn, and complain - and most fools
do.Unknown

Education

If a man is a fool, you don't train him out of being a fool by sending
him to university. You merely turn him into a trained fool, ten times more
dangerous.Bagley, Desmond

Foolishness

No man really becomes a fool until he stops asking
questionsSteinmetz, Charles

There is in human nature generally more of the fool than of the
wise.Bacon, Sir Francis

He who asks is a fool for five minutes, but he who does not ask remains
a fool forever.Proverb, Chinese

Never give advice...A wise man won't need itA fool won't heed
it.

Unknown

You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people
all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.Lincoln,
President Abraham

What the wise seek is in themselves, what the fool seeks is in
others.Confucius

'Tis better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than open one's
mouth and remove all doubt.Johnson, Dr Samuel

Giving a fool advice is like hitting the air with a
stick.Unknown

A fool is someone whose pencil wears out before its eraser
doesSavant, Marilyn vos

Only a fool learns from his own mistakes. The wise man learns from the
mistakes of othersBismarck, Otto von

The fool wonders, the wise man asksDisraeli, Benjamin

A fool and his money were lucky to get together in the first
place.Anderson, Harry

He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot
lose.Elliot, Jim
Hymn: He Is No Fool

Who's more foolish, the fool or the fool who follows him?Kenobi,
Obi-Wan (Ben) Star
Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope

Friendship

There are a good many fools who call me a friend, and also a good many
friends who call me a fool.Chesterton, Gilbert Keith

Genders

As blushing will sometimes make a whore pass for a virtuous woman, so
modesty may make a fool seem a man of senseSwift, Jonathan

Happiness

There is a difference between happiness and wisdom: He that thinks
himself the happiest man really is so; but he that thinks himself the
wisest is generally the greatest fool.Colton, Charles Caleb

'fool'

Humour Bushisms

There's an old saying in Tennessee - I know it's in Texas, probably in
Tennessee - that says 'Fool me once, shame on … shame on you. … Fool me ……
you can't get fooled againBush, President George W

Humour Misc

If at first you don't succeed, give up. No use being a damn
foolUnknown
Murphy's Laws

Ideas And Dreams

My imagination makes me human and makes me a fool; it gives me all the
world and exiles me from it.Le Guin, Ursula Kroeber

Inspirational

Every fool knows you can't touch the stars, but it doesn't stop a wise
man from tryingAnderson, Harry

Intelligence

An intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more
violent. It takes a touch of genius, and a lot of courage, to move in the
opposite direction.Akhtar, Hoshang N

Lies And Truth

When you want to fool the world, tell the truthBismarck, Otto
von

It takes a wise man to handle a lie; a fool had better remain
honest.Douglas, George Norman

Love

A mother takes twenty years to make a man of her boy, and another woman
makes a fool of him in twenty minutesFrost, Robert

Never let a fool kiss you or a kiss fool you…Adams, Joey Lauren

Oh, innocent victims of Cupid, remember this terse little verse: To let
a fool kiss you is stupid. To let a kiss fool you is worseHarburg,
Edgar Yipsel

Mistakes

The main difference between the wise man and a fool is that a fool's
mistakes never teach him anything.Unknown

Nationality

The constitution gives every American the inalienable right to make a
damn fool of himselfCiardi, John

Politics

Sometimes in politics one must duel with skunks, but no one should be
fool enough to allow the skunks to choose the weaponsCannon, Joe

Science And Technology

Scientists are the easiest to fool. They think in straight,
predictable, directable, and therefore misdirectable, lines. The only
world they know is the one where everything has a logical explanation and
things are what they appear to be. Children and conjurors - they terrify
me. Scientists are no problem; against them I feel quite
confidentHogan, James P

Success

A life spent in constant labor is a life wasted, save a man be such a
fool as to regard a fulsome obituary notice as ample rewardNathan,
George Jean

Uncertainty

Only a fool tests the water with both feet.Proverb, African

Wisdom

The heart of a fool is in his mouth, but the mouth of a wise man is in
his heart.Franklin, Benjamin

Every man is a damn fool for at least five minutes every day; wisdom
consists in not exceeding the limitHubbard, Elbert

A spoon does not know the taste of soup, nor a learned fool the taste
of wisdom.Proverb, Welsh

A wise man knows his limitations but never sets limits on himself. A
fool does not recognize his limitations, thus limiting
himself.Martino, Joseph P

The fool who fancies he is full of wisdom while he sits by his hearth
at home quickly finds when questioned by others, that he knows nothing at
all.Proverb, Viking

Take all the fools out of this world and there wouldn't be any fun
living in it, or profit.

~ Josh Billings ~

Every fool finds a greater one to admire them.

~ Bioleau ~

A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.

~ William Blake ~

Foolproof systems do not take into account the ingenuity of fools.

~ Gene Brown ~

In the vain laughter of folly wisdom hears half its applause.

~ George Eliot ~

The entire world is my temple, and a very fine one too, if I'm not
mistaken, and I'll never lack priests to serve it as long as there are
men.

~ Desiderius Erasmus ~

There are two fools in this world. One is the millionaire who thinks
that by hoarding money he can somehow accumulate real power, and the other
is the penniless reformer who thinks that if only he can take the money
from one class and give it to another, all the world's ills will be
cured.

~ Henry Ford ~

Who is more foolish, the child afraid of the dark, or the man afraid of
the light?

~ Maurice Freehill ~

A mother takes twenty years to make a man of her boy, and another woman
makes a fool of him in twenty minutes.

~ Robert Frost ~

No one but a fool would measure their satisfaction by what the world
thinks of it.

~ Oliver Goldsmith ~

While intelligent people can often simplify the complex, a fool is more
likely to complicate the simple.

~ Gerald W. Grumet ~

When in doubt, make a fool of yourself. There is a microscopically thin
line between being brilliantly creative and acting like the most gigantic
idiot on earth. So what the hell, leap.

~ Cynthia Heimel ~

Why fools are endowed by nature with voices so much louder than
sensible people possess is a mystery. It is a fact emphasized throughout
history.

~ Hertzler ~

The biggest fool in the world is he who merely does his work supremely
well, without attending to appearance.

~ Michael Korda ~

He who lives without folly isn't so wise as he thinks.

~ Francois De La Rochefoucauld ~

You ask whether I have ever been in love: fool as I am, I am not such a
fool as that. But if one is only to talk from first-hand experience,
conversation would be a very poor business. But though I have no personal
experience of the things they call love, I have what is better -- the
experience of Sappho, of Euripides, of Catallus, of Shakespeare, of
Spenser, of Austen, of Bronte, of anyone else I have read.

~ C. S. Lewis ~

Colleges don't make fools, they only develop them.

~ Geroge Lorimer ~

The fool is always beginning to live.

~ Proverb ~

Fools build houses, and wise men buy them.

~ English Proverb ~

Don't approach a goat from the front, a horse from the back, or a fool
from any side.

~ Jewish Proverb ~

What a fool does in the end, the wise do in the beginning.

~ Spanish Proverb ~

A spoon does not know the taste of soup, nor a learned fool the taste
of wisdom.

~ Welsh Proverb ~

They never open their mouths without subtracting from the sum of human
knowledge.

~ Thomas Brackett Reed ~

The great God endows His children variously. To some he gives intellect
-- and they move the earth. To some he allots heart -- and the beating
pulse of humanity is theirs. But to some He gives only a soul, without
intelligence -- and these, who never grow up, but remain always His
children, are God's fools, kindly, elemental, simple, as if from His
palette the Artist of all had taken one color instead of many.

~ Mary Roberts Rinehart ~

The haste of a fool is the slowest thing in the world.

~ Thomas Shadwell ~

Lord, what fools these mortals be.

~ William Shakespeare ~

On Monday mornings I am dedicated to the proposition that all men are
created jerks.

~ H. Allen Smith ~

Seek but provision of bread and wine, fools to flatter, and clothing
fine; and nothing of God shall ever be thine.

~ Wes Smith ~

That's the penalty we have to pay for our acts of foolishness --
someone else always suffers for them.

~ Alfred Sutro ~

It is impossible to make anything foolproof because fools are so
ingenious.

The little foolery that wise men have makes a great show.
As You Like It.
Act i. Sc. 2

I had rather have a fool to make me merry than experience
to make me sad.
As You Like It. Act iv. Sc. 1. The fool doth think
he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.
As You Like It.
Act v. Sc. 1.